The Case-Shiller 20-city index released today has fallen under the bubble-crash low of April 2009 and confirms a double-dip in home prices. S&P reports a 4.2% national fall in values just in the first quarter of this year.
“Home prices continue on their downward spiral with no relief in sight,” said David Blitzer, chairman of the S&P index committee (See his comment “How the Cities Did“).
Prices have declined for 57 consecutive months in Zillow’s price index. The 10-City S&P Index has fallen 33% from the peak.
“In real terms, all appreciation in the last decade is gone,” said Bill McBride, author at Calculated Risk, a leading source of breaking news in charted format (see Case Shiller data above).
The April reading of pending home sales fell by 11.6% from March. Mortgage delinquencies have flattened out and may be a lone positive indicator.
“Mortgage delinquencies are off their peak highs,” said the Wall Street Journal today (See their post today “Five Questions on Tuesday’s S&P/Case-Shiller“). “This suggests that, for now, the problem isn’t getting worse.”
housingstory.net 
Hey Michael – I run into a lot of people who are in complete denial about what happened in real estate, the magnitude of fraud (liar loans, Option ARM, etc) and phoney ‘home equity’ that drove prices up to the 2006 peak. They don’t “get it” that the return to solid loan underwriting guarantees prices in most areas will fall to (my guess) 1998-2000 levels. Curious if your clients “get it”. Thanks
Hi Chuck, I would describe many persons as hopeful values haven’t changed but also worried and concerned that they have changed. It’s a mix of fear and faith. mdw
One other question. From what I read, the Case-Schiller report did not include information about the Seattle area this time, suggesting to me (if indeed this area was not discussed in the report) that Seattle is not and will not be seeing the type of continuing price falls that are clearly evident in the other discussed areas, and that it may even be exempt from problems down the line. Am I correct? What do you see happening, both now and down the road in the Seattle area? Thank you.
“Seattle was up a modest 0.1% for the month, but still down 7.5% versus March 2010.” From the S&P report. I don’t have any opinion about Seattle’s prices.
Please explain and elaborate on your last sentence. It appears to contain a typo (with word ‘prices’ being in plural tense). Do you mean to say that your informal projections predict a big fall in prices is yet to come? Thank you.
Hi Carol, The chart is corrected now. The informal projections show a big fall in prices still ahead. Thanks for the comment. Michael